Wishful Thinking

Chapter 2-1

2

The world seemed to spin around her. Right then, Autumn really wished those damn boots she’d thought were so cute didn’t have such high heels.

It couldn’t be possible. There was no way that Damon Wilcox was standing a few feet away from her, smiling and inviting them all inside.

Both her parents walked into the house as if this was all the most natural thing in the world. In a daze, Autumn followed, mostly because she couldn’t think of what else to do.

The inside of the house looked exactly the way she remembered it. Or rather, most of it seemed familiar, although she could have sworn the couches in the living room had once been dark brown leather instead of the cream-colored ones that occupied the space now, and the rug beneath them also seemed lighter in color, soft sage and cream and deep taupe rather than the red and brown one that had once covered the shining wood floor.

All around her were Wilcox cousins, talking and laughing, eating and drinking, as though they had no reason in the world to think that their presence in Damon’s house was anything except perfectly normal. They all seemed to be exactly the same ages they were supposed to be, and so the sensation of dissonance about the scene was that much stronger.

None of these people should have been inside this house for years and years.

Their little group entered the family room, which adjoined the kitchen. Autumn’s mother made a beeline for the buffet table off to one side of the space, and eased her casserole out of its quilted carrier so she could place it next to all the other dishes spread across the white cloth–covered surface.

No time for anything more than that one glance, though, because Autumn stopped stock still as she recognized the woman whom Damon approached…and then slipped a casual arm around her waist.

Angela McAllister.

Autumn blinked. True, a transformed Angela, in a sleek red wrap dress and high-heeled boots, with her mane of unruly, wavy hair flat-ironed into submission and red lipstick on her full mouth, but Angela nonetheless. She smiled as Damon bent and murmured a few words in her ear, but Autumn thought she noted something taut in that smile, as if she’d forced it out because it was expected and not because she’d truly found anything humorous in what Damon had just said to her.

Then one hand went up to push a lock of straightened hair behind her ear, and a large diamond flashed on her hand. Autumn knew what Angela’s engagement ring looked like, and it was nowhere near as big as the one she was wearing now. Almost inexorably, her gaze went to Damon’s left hand.

A band of white gold — or maybe platinum — gleamed on his ring finger.

The Damon she’d known hadn’t worn a wedding ring. His wife had been dead for years, tragically killed in a car accident, along with their unborn child.

This can’t be happening.

Hoping she didn’t look as shell-shocked as she felt, Autumn turned away from the couple and headed over to the buffet table. At one end were glasses and various bottles of wine, and she reached for one of the bottles without glancing at the label and poured herself some. Maybe getting drunk wasn’t a very good idea, but she felt as though she needed something to steady her nerves.

As she shifted out of the way so a couple of her cousins from Holbrook could get near the drinks, she found herself stiffening. Leaning against the wall in the corner opposite her — and looking as though he wanted to be anywhere but there — was her cousin Connor.

He seemed thinner than he should be, his gauntness only highlighting the high cheekbones and longish nose he’d inherited from his distant Navajo ancestors. He wasn’t looking at her, though. No, his gaze was fixed on Angela where she stood next to Damon, those green eyes burning with need.

And hate.

Once again, Autumn thought this had to be a nightmare. It wasn’t, unfortunately.

No, this was her horrible “gift” giving her exactly what she’d wished for.

A world in which she would never have met Michael McAllister.

In a way, she had to admire the cold logic of the whole situation. The easiest way to keep her out of Michael’s orbit, after all, would be to make a world where Damon Wilcox had succeeded in taking Angela McAllister for his own, a world where the two clans could never be anything but bitter enemies. In such a world, there was no way Autumn would ever have casually crossed paths with Michael at Northern Pines the way she had in her own world.

Looking at him as he’d come down the library steps toward her on that mild fall afternoon, she’d been immediately caught by the way the sun caught glints of gold in his light brown hair, and how his eyes had seemed to reflect the blue of the sky. He looked utterly unlike any of her Wilcox cousins — and yet she’d known right away that he was a warlock, since she got the familiar ringing in her ears as he approached.

The startled flicker in those clear blue eyes told her he’d sensed she was a witch as well, and they’d smiled at each other. He stopped to introduce himself, and she realized right away that it must have been fate that brought her to the library that day. As a law student, he might otherwise have remained entirely outside her orbit.

They’d chatted for a bit, and he offered to buy her some coffee. Since her trip to the library hadn’t been an urgent one, she’d immediately accepted.

And the rest, as they say, was history.

Except now that history had been erased by a single careless wish.

Autumn forced herself to lift her glass of wine to her lips and take a sip, although the cabernet tasted bitter as gall. How could she have been so stupid? All those years of training herself to never say, “I wish,” to never even allow those words to cross her mind, and yet she’d let herself get angry enough with Michael that all her discipline had flown right out the window.

It was cowardly, but she knew she couldn’t stay in here and look at Connor’s haunted face a moment longer, or see the possessive way Damon’s arm remained wrapped around Angela’s waist. She needed to go someplace where she could think. Unfortunately, even though snow wasn’t in the forecast, the temperature outside was still bitterly cold, and Autumn doubted she would be able to simply slip out onto the patio and hide there until it was time to go home.

Well, she’d go back to the living room. At least Damon and Angela didn’t seem inclined to leave their current post in the family room, so maybe she’d have a few minutes of reprieve.

Autumn had barely taken a few steps in that direction before she almost bumped into her cousin Laurel, who’d been headed down the hallway toward the family room.

“Whoa,” Laurel said, putting a steadying hand on Autumn’s arm. “Are you okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I have seen a ghost…or the closest thing to one, Autumn thought humorlessly, although she didn’t offer a direct response to her friend’s comment. “I’m fine,” she said automatically.

Laurel lifted an eyebrow. To Autumn’s relief, her cousin looked much the same as she always had, her long wavy hair just a bit wild, skin slightly tanned from some time on the ski slopes. Noticeably absent, though, was the fabulous rock Jason Ludlow had given her for an engagement ring.

Of course she doesn’t have the ring, Autumn told herself. With Damon in charge, I doubt Jake’s running his witch-finding operation. And without Trident Enterprises, Laurel wouldn’t have had any reason to go to Lake Tahoe and bump into Jason Ludlow.

So many threads that had gotten unraveled. Autumn’s head fairly swam as she tried to conjure up all the various ramifications of Damon being still alive…of Angela being his consort rather than married to Connor.

Of the McAllisters still being the Wilcoxes’ sworn enemies.

“You don’t look fine,” Laurel said, examining her critically. “You’re white as a sheet.”

“Forgot to put on blush,” Autumn replied. She supposed she should be relieved that even in this universe, Laurel appeared to be a good friend. And she was desperately in need of a friend right now. Driven by a sudden impulse, she added, “Are you doing anything tomorrow?”

“Hitting the after-Christmas sales,” Laurel responded with a frown, as if she couldn’t quite understand why Autumn had asked the question in the first place. “Don’t you remember? We made plans a while ago. I’m picking you up at ten.”

It was something she and Laurel had often done — heading out to raid the post-holiday sales at the Flagstaff Mall. This year, of course, Laurel had been preoccupied with hosting her Boxing Day party, but in this world, there would be no party because there was no new house, no new husband…nothing much to celebrate.

“Right,” Autumn said, hoping Laurel hadn’t noticed her hesitation. “Sorry — I guess with all the running around and getting ready for the potluck, it just slipped my mind.”

“No worries,” her cousin responded, but Autumn saw the way Laurel’s eyes narrowed, how she eyed her friend critically, obviously looking to see if she really was okay. “Unless you’re coming down with something. Honestly, you don’t look so good.”

So much for checking her appearance in the mirror and thinking she seemed just fine. Then again, that was before she’d seen her cousin Damon — a man who’d been buried almost ten years earlier — walking around and looking hale and hearty. True, he had some gray at the temples that hadn’t been there the last time she’d seen him, at another holiday potluck held in this very house a decade ago, but otherwise, he seemed to be doing well, still slim and athletic in build, with a brisk, restless energy that was uniquely his.

“I didn’t sleep well,” Autumn lied. “But I’m totally up for shopping tomorrow.”

Damn right she was. She needed to be someplace alone with Laurel so she could tell her cousin what was going on and ask for her input. There was definitely a chance…a fairly big one…that Laurel would think she’d lost her mind, but Autumn was willing to take that risk. She couldn’t confide in her parents; while they tended to be sympathetic most of the time, she could only imagine what they would think if she tried to tell them they were all living in an alternate universe that her own horrible talent had conjured up out of nothing.

Well, not exactly nothing. She’d put the wish in motion, even if she hadn’t actually meant what she was saying. In a way, she supposed she should be impressed at the magnitude of the wish her magical ability had brought into being. Having ponies and cupcakes appear out of thin air was one thing. Making the entire world shift just to have her avoid ever meeting Michael McAllister was something else altogether.

“Great,” Laurel said, a smile returning to her features. She’d always been the sort of person who couldn’t remain troubled for very long. “Because I’ve got some Christmas money burning a hole in my pocket, so I’m hoping for some deep discounts.”

“We’ll find them,” Autumn promised. It wasn’t a lie, either — she’d always had a particular knack for finding the one fabulous designer piece at eighty percent off buried somewhere on a sales rack. Maybe it was another magical gift…or just good eyes. Either way, whoever went shopping with her always seemed to have better luck than if they’d gone on their own.

Laurel lifted the glass of wine she held and took a sip. Then her expression turned furtive. “Uh-oh…there’s Jeff. Let’s go hide in the dining room.”

For a second, Autumn didn’t understand what her cousin was talking about. Then she remembered that back in the day, Laurel’s parents had tried several times to hook her up with Jeff Garnett, a distant cousin whose family lived in Holbrook. In her own universe, they’d laid off after a while, but it seemed that here, they hadn’t quite given up yet.

“Definitely,” she agreed, and the two of them slipped across the hallway and into the dining room, whose table groaned with more food and where enough people were congregated that Jeff probably wouldn’t be able to spot them.

And, to Autumn’s relief, there was no sign of Damon or Angela or Connor in there, either. Something about seeing the three of them in one place, seeing how badly her magic had messed things up, only made the situation that much worse. She had to figure out a way how to fix this, but she couldn’t do it with the evidence of her folly staring her in the face.

All she could do was hope that Laurel might have some words of advice to offer the next day.